Introduction

Blogger @BeingDifferent summarizes some of the key findings of the 500+ page book 'Invading the Sacred' (ITS) that represents a scholarly critique of Hinduism Studies in North America. The recent Penguin-books controversy was milked to the max by Wendy Doniger & co., driving the sales of her seriously flawed book "The Hindus' that denigrates Hinduism and India's freedom fighters all the way to the top: #1 best-seller in Amazon's religion section. On the other hand, Rajiv Malhotra has made ITS, the book that rebuts such distorted works by non-practitioners of Hinduism freely downloadable to counter the continuing misrepresentations of Doniger & co. It is noteworthy that Doniger & co. have not been able to challenge any of the scholarly assertions in ITS and have always shied away from a public debate with Rajiv Malhotra. This is a must-read book for Hindus all over the world. Rajiv Malhotra later wrote 'Breaking India', 'Being Different', and most recently, 'Indra's Net'. Each of them a best-selling masterpiece that most readers have described in one word: Unignorable.

The following blogs provide a condensed summary of ITS' findings. We
hope this encourages critical-thinking Hindus to take a few weeks to
read ITS in its original form fully and recognize the underlying Kurukshetra
that has unfolded, and the unprecedented challenges that Hinduism, and
indeed, all Dharmic thought systems, face today.

Rajiv Malhotra's [RM] messages were
summarized in aprevious bloga few weeks ago. These messages were aimed
at a deeper level in that it enumerated the prerequisites (according to RM)
that are required to become an Intellectual Kshatriya (IK). One might ask what
is the need for an IK? This too was answered to some degree in that blog. To restate
the answer in brief - RM's work exposes the deep prejudices prevalent against
Dharmic traditions and India within academic and political circles at a global
scale. One of the consequences of such
prejudices is that Hinduism does not have a seat at the table when the Indic/Hindu
traditions are discussed and deliberated upon at power circles which give
directions to geopolitics. The end result is the propagation of a distorted
view of these age old traditions seriously undermining India's integral unity
and thereby India’s role in the world. To counter such unfair prejudices
and give the Dharmic traditions their rightful place requires providing correct
interpretations of the traditions by virtue of originating from the traditions
themselves. This therefore is naturally a battle of the minds. Intellectual Kshatriyas
are required.

A cursory glance at India's pre-colonial history
will reveal the advances India made, and indeed has contributed, in the field of mind
sciences, medicine, mathematics, etc. And yet, India's current image in
the world-stage is 'caste, cow and curry - the latest additions being Bollywood
and India as a repository of trinkets, which can be bought to adorn one's
living space'. How many of the readers have this image of India, while
completely oblivious to India's contributions to the world? RM's crusade has
been to bring this issue to the fore. Not only that, an even more serious issue
is the appropriation of the Indian ideas (on medicine and mind sciences in
particular) and peddled as being of non-Indian origin.

RM has essentially worked to expose these prejudices. Please read theprevious blogto get a glimpse of RM's journey in
the past 25 years. For those not aware of RM’s works, he has written three
books “Breaking India”, “Being Different”, “Indra’s Net” and the main
protagonist of a fourth called “Invading the Sacred”. His latest book "The Battle for Sanskrit" is due to come out in Jan.'16. Recently, Aditi Banerjee, a noted
professional journalist, described RM's work succinctly -"Rajiv Malhotra has been a
ground-breaking thinker and writer on matters related to Hinduism and Indian
civilization for decades now. He has single-handedly and courageously
challenged a coterie of Western Indologists and associated forces bent on
denigrating Indic traditions and [who are] denying the national and
civilizational unity of India and Hinduism".Apart from his books, his excellent
scholarship on the forces trying to destabilize India has earned him plenary
(invited) talks at conferences both in India and, indeed, mostly abroad. He has
also debated with top researchers and religious men(Dr. Christian A. Eberhart:
Professor of Religious Studies @ University of Houston),Prof. Francis X. Clooney (Harvard Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts), media personnel (Mark Tully: Ex-Bureau Chief of BBC, New Delhi),and shared
the dais with policy makers (Arun Shourie), as well as traditional gurus
(yoga guru: Baba Ramdev). A simple keyword search with his name
results in numerous hits on Youtube (including the ones listed above). His
works have prompted articles to be published in journals such as the International
Journal of Hindu Studies. It is abundantly clear that his scholarship is
excellent which has forced people to think about the arguments he presents.

I have watched most of RM's
lectures on Youtube and have read parts of two of his books. While his lectures
are lucid and points easily understood, I must caution the uninitiated that his
books are not amusement readings! Recently, one of the Discussion group members
(Sriram) initiated an interesting discussion topic – “How have you benefited
from Rajivji’s works?” To anyone who has been exposed to RM’s works, or perhaps
even not exposed to his works, Sriram has asked a very pertinent question. For
me, the answer has been an extended awareness of “how the geo-political
situation of the world is aligned”. For instance, I can now understand the
nuances when a professor of Engineering (as opposed to a Professor in
social-sciences/history/Indology) who also happens to be non-Asian, engages me in
a discussion about Brahmins and the caste system. I recently read an
article about the numbers-game that Evangelicals are involved in. I can now
understand their obsession with the target number of conversions they have to
achieve in a certain time frame. Rajiv's works have given me a new lens to see
the world with. And the more I see the world with this new found lens, the more
robust RM’s thesis seems to be.

But what about the
others? What have they gleaned from RM’s scholarship? This short article
summarizes the responses from other group members.

To begin with, the audience, at least the ones
who have responded to Sriram’s question, come from a diverse background –
engineers, current and prospective students, working professionals – the full
range, and as diverse a country as Australia to India to South Africa to the
USA. The responses had a sense of excitement and they all seem to agree that
RM’s work was a revelation and that his work has been an inspiration. Some said
they have devoted themselves to becoming an IK, others said they understand
whatpurva-pakshameans and its importance, some have
started local reading groups to discuss Rajiv's works, and yet others said they
now understand the complexities of the problems faced by India.

Reading through their responses, it
appears that there are some profound insights developed in whoever has come
across RM's works. These insights can be categorized into the following three
sets of keywords: Hinduism and its differences with the Abrahamic religions,
the attack on India/Hinduism and its traditions, and the ability to engage in
Hinduism related debates. Let us briefly unpack these categories.

Hinduism and its differences
with the Abrahamic religions:

First and foremost, there is a
clearer understanding of what Hinduism is amongst those who have been exposed
to RM's works. There is now an understanding that Hinduism is a Dharmic
tradition with integral unity with other Dharmic traditions such as Buddhism,
Sikhism, and Jainism. Integral unity means that the fundamental basis of all
these traditions is the same. The unifying factors being that all of these
traditions agree upon the idea of dharma,
the need for individual karma (actions)
in the present time for an individual’s liberation (as opposed to the idea that
an individual's salvation is dependent upon the birth and actions of one
figure who appeared in the distant historical past) and the idea of
reincarnation. For example, Buddha taught about a Dharmic way of life
which is very similar to the ‘yama’ practices found in the yoga philosophy of
Hinduism (compare Panchsheela in
Buddhism to the five yamasin
Patanjali's yoga sutra). More importantly, noneof these traditions are based on
history-centrism. The implication of non-history-centricism is that even if
Buddha/Prince Gautam did not come into being, the principles of Dharma that he
eventually taught (i.e. after his enlightenment), would still remain intact. ”Buddha
did not teach Buddhism”, said my yoga teacher! I understood what he meant.

In contrast, the negation of the
history of Jesus with a birth from a virgin mother would result in the entire
religion of Christianity to fall down. Same with the Islamic faith, albeit with
the history of Prophet Mohammad in their case. Holding on to the story of
Jesus’ birth steadfastly is central to the Christian faith i.e. Christianity is
history-centric. Same with the Islamic faith, albeit with the story of Prophet
Mohammad in their case. There are other core differences as well,
for e.g. the nature of time in the Dharmic traditions is completely different
to the idea of time in the Abrahamic religions.

Attack on India/Hinduism and its
traditions:

Perhaps one of the biggest revelations
from RM's work is that there is a constant attack on India via Hinduism. Much
has been written by RM and indeed others, which need not be repeated here.
Pertinent examples will suffice to bring out the relevant points. Here is one.
In his recent visit to India, US President Barack Obama, in a tone of
complaint, remarked that India's success depends upon India safeguarding the
interests of it's religious minorities. Now consider this. Immediately
after the India visit, the US President went on a State visit to Saudi Arabia, accompanied
with his wife. The strife between Shia and Sunni denominations of Islam in
Saudi Arabia (and indeed the Islamic states in general) is well known. And yet,
not a word was, or has been, spoken by Mr Obama on the rights of religious
minorities in Saudi Arabia. Besides, the reader will recall the massive outcry
in Saudi Arabia on Mrs Obama's headscarf, or lack thereof, during this same
visit. Indeed, Mr Obama had no comments to make on this incident as well. To
put things in perspective, regarding the state of religious minorities in India
– Jews, certainly a religious minority in India in terms of absolute numbers,
settled in India in distant past going back several centuries. As it turns out,
India is one country where the Jews have not been persecuted - not once in
their long history of being in India. Note that Britain, Spain or France
doesn't have bragging rights on their treatment of Jews in their respective
countries in the relatively more recent past.

It would not be
remiss here to recount RM's debate experiences with representatives (some of
them being at very high positions in their respective faith organizations) of
the Abrahamic religions at various platforms over the years. He has espoused
the notion of replacing the use of 'religious tolerance', which is a marginalizing
idea, with the all-encompassing idea of 'mutual respect'. Needless to say, his
attempts have been futile so far. It is noteworthy that representatives of
Dharmic traditions have found the idea of 'mutual respect' to be easily
acceptable. And yet, President Obama found it appropriate to make a comment on
India on its religious affairs! Such is the prevalent geopolitical scenario.

The point here is
that the intellectually alert must ponder, and if possible, seek the answers to
such questions as - what made Mr Obama comment on India about its religious
minorities but not a word on Saudi Arabia? Why are the Abrahamic religions persistent
on using the word ‘religious tolerance’?

The attack on
Hinduism is on another front – subtle, and yet an equally dangerous process of
digestion. Here the useful things/ideas of a given culture is slowly
appropriated and disembodied from the original culture by the digesters. Themodus operandiis that while one hand is pointing
fingers at all that is bad in a given culture, the other hand is gladly
appropriating the traditional knowledge systems from the very culture that the
former hand is criticizing. William Jones' motif at Oxford is a glaring example
(seehere). It’s a generic phenomenon which
has been repeated in history several times and Hinduism/India is not the only one to suffer.Accelerated attempts at
appropriation-digestion of Yoga is one such example that India would do well to
take steps to counter. RM gives the example of Christian Yoga where 'Sun
salutation (surya-namaskar)' has been changed to 'Son salutation' i.e.
Salutation to the Son of God = Jesus, with no mention of the Indian philosophy behind
the word ‘surya-namaskar’. The irony
of this episode is that one of the fiveyamasmentioned earlier is calledastaya, which means
non-stealing! The original true philosophy of yoga has been well and truly stripped
off.

Ability to engage in Hinduism
related debates:

Readers, armed with a better
understanding, can now engage in intellectual debates on Dharmic tradition vs
Abrahamic religions. They have also acquired a new vocabulary, a significant
part of which RM calls, the “Sanskrit non-translatables”.Atman,Shradhdha,Dharmaare some examples of
non-translatables. For instance, ‘Atman’ is not the same as ‘Soul’ and therefore
Atman cannot, and should not be translated as 'Soul'. As currently defined, 'Soul'
is something that a human being possesses. By extension to non-human forms of
life, the claim is that the animals/trees don’thave 'Souls'. Thus, 'Soul'
is akin to an object that only a human being can possess, which leaves the body
when the physical body perishes (a New Age lingo often heard). Atman, on the
other hand, is immanent in everything, both living and inanimate objects
and therefore, is present everywhere and at all times. Thus it cannot
‘leave’ from one object to another or from one place to another or from one
time to another. Thus'Atman'
and 'Soul' describe two very different philosophies. 'Atman' is non-translatable.

In the final analysis, a veil
has been lifted from the reader's eyes and they can now clearly see what is at
stake. The readers draw inspiration from RM and his works, have a new
found confidence, and they are eager to devote their time to learning -
not only from RM's monumental work, but also from other sources. RM’s works
coaxes us to do so.

Rajiv Malhotra responds to some frequently asked questions in the forum on his new book that is being published by Harper Collins, India. The book can be pre-ordered at Amazon.

Is it a book on Sanskrit? No. It is NOT a book on Sanskrit. You will not learn any Sanskrit reading it. Nor will you learn the glories of Sanskrit. There are already many nice books for these topics and many experts far better qualified than me.

Then what is it about? It is a book on the academic field of Indology, a field that is rooted in Sanskrit studies. It is a purva-paksha and uttara-paksha on the output being produced by that field. It examines the substance of the Indological works, as seen from the perspective of an insider/practitioner of our faith. It also examines the power structure of that field and how that has eroded the traditional adhikara. It shows how the ideas starting in this field have become widespread

Is it the same thing more or less as in your prior books? No at all. I do NOT examine any scholar here that I have ever examined previously. Nor are the serious issues here the same as those discussed in my earlier works. Chapter 1 summarizes the main issues very clearly. The Conclusion chapter lists the 18 debates/discussions that are needed going forward as a result of this book's findings. Bottom line: You must read it and not start commenting with your opinions based on prior information and knowledge you have.

Is it about Sheldon Pollock? No. It is about a school of ideology that I have termed "American Orientalism". First I explain the earlier European Orientalism (which I call Orientalism 1.0) and then I explain how this new Orientalism 2.0 is a more evolved/sophisticated and dangerous version. It shows how we are being re-colonized & digested while we are imagining that we are being promoted.

Why so much emphasis on Pollock then? To sharpen my analysis, I never want to discuss in abstractions, but in concrete terms dealing with concrete writings of specific pioneering thinkers. So I always pick one or two top leaders of a given school of thought and focus on that person(s) to make my points. I use Pollock as the leader of this genre, who is in fact the most important Indologist in my opinion that we must study and engage today. Hence, Pollock is a window into a wider phenomenon.

Is this anything to do with Wendy Doniger? Not so. Pollock is not at all like Doniger. He is a far deeper, more accomplished Sanskrit scholar. His criticisms of the Sanskrit texts are not at all based on Freudian psychoanalysis while Doniger's work is based on that.

Are you attacking Pollock? Not at all. I introduce him in detail as a solid scholar. I disagree with his premises, methods and conclusions because these are counter to how our tradition sees itself, especially those who are devout practitioners. But I am respectful of him personally. He is a product of his training and his background, and I am approaching this as an "insider" who is invested in the tradition while he is an outsider with an entirely different investment.

What are your main issues with Pollock and his school? I criticize his determination throughout his work to remove the sacredness, his determination to focus on social oppression which he claims is at the heart of the Sanskrit texts, and his attempts to see our sacred texts as designed for political exploitation. The byline under the title on the cover, "Is Sanskrit ...." says it all. These three issues are each very serious and impact the way our civilization has been misrepresented.

Do you want Pollock and his team to stop their work? Not at all. I believe in intellectual freedom. Nor can I compel them to alter what they do, even if I were to try. It makes no sense to ask the opposing cricket team to stop playing so hard against our team. Furthermore, such churning of opposites is the way manthana works, so it can also be useful for us to face his challenge.

In that case, what is your desired goal in writing this book? My call to action is to the insiders, the traditional scholars, the leaders of our dharma institutions today. They need to wake up, get out of their isolation sitting in silos. They must engage in serious purva-paksha and uttara-paksha. I can with confidence that till now NOBODY IN THE TRADITIONAL SIDE HAS EVER STUDIED POLLOCK OR THE REST OF HIS SCHOOL AND GIVEN A RESPONSE. I know this from numerous traditional scholars I consulted in the course of my own research. Why must I have to do this work while hundreds of scholars with great qualifications and prestigious positions never bothered to do so?

Why have our traditional never bothered to do this kind of work? I address this issue in a specific section of the book, titled, 'Where is the home team?' Later on, in the final chapter, I also have a section that comes back to this issue. It is titled, 'The death of purva-paksha', in which I explain the history of the decline of our purva-paksha tradition. Why did we fail to do this purva-paksha to early Christians, later Medieval Christians after Vasco da Gama, Islamic invaders, more recent Marxists and postmodernists? What caused our "experts" to hide under the fascade of being introverted? Why this capitulation? I offer my explanations and also a psychological model of our vulnerability. This insight can then lead to a remedy that I suggest.

Namaste! Have you read the book 'Indra's Net', Being Different' or 'Breaking India'? A key focus of this blog is to promote original Indian thought by curating the huge body of work done by Rajiv Malhotra. We summarize key discussions at Rajiv Malhotra's forum, his books, and debates.

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Please follow today's twitter thread discussing this event where this scholar is to be honored.

Request 1: Dont look for bad "person" please. By now you ought to be able to evaluate scholarship.

Request 2: Dont even say he does "bad scholarship". The bowler on the opponent team who gets our batsmen out quickly, cannot be called a bad bowler. He is a great bowler for HIS team. Similarly, many Indologists I critique are good at their job for their civilization. But the basic lens, assumptions, framework, etc used are Western. They are entitled to use their lens. But our leaders should know better, and not simply eat out of their hands.

Prof Stietencron is a figure mentioned in Indra's Net as a pioneer of Neo-Hinduism. (two paragraphs from Indra's Net are shown below)

This means his work is based on the assumption that Hinduism is falsely considered to be intrinsically unified. Until recent centuries, he claims, the various streams were not only separate but in mutual conflict. Only recently were these streams brought together into a single philosophy and made to look unified.

In other words, Neo-Hinduism considers our tradition to be a synthetic unity and not an integral unity. The synthesis, according to them, was done recently. This is a big deal for us to understand and contest.

Request 3: Do NOT mix this issue with the history of the name "Hinduism". It does not matter what people called it earlier, or whether they even had any name for it. The issue being discussed by him and me is whether there was a philosophically unified set of ideas across the spectrum we now call Hinduism. If your name changes, it does not mean you are not the same person. After 20 yrs of explaining the basic point I continue to get stupid issues raised like: "Hindu name is new because ....; and therefore, ...." Please focus on what this thread is about, what Stietencron's thesis is, what Neo-Hinduism thesis is.

I am attaching one of his papers referenced in IN. You cant blame his rigor, level of intensity or hard work. The question to ask is whether he exaggerates differences and downplays underlying unity. Does he fail to see the integral unity at the foundation?

To understand the issue from my viewpoint will force you to read IN. Only those who have done so may genuinely contribute to this thread. We are not looking for personal "opinions" or blaming his intentions, or any such generic level of discussion.

Due diligence: I cannot believe the GOI did proper due diligence in this situation, before creating a major Indology conference behind closed doors with some select few voices invited. They might now be claiming due diligence out of defensiveness. This is GOI's very formal and official stamp of approval on Western Indology.

Purva-paksha and uttara-paksha on Stietencron would require GOI to read my critique and address it alongside his work. Otherwise it is one-sided propaganda and awe of a white man just because he is a Sanskrit scholar. Our inferiority complex is so deep towards any Westerners who seems to say a few words of praise for us, who worked hard to study us, etc.

Our purva-paksha tradition does not permit making evaluations based on the personalities of the parties; this must be done strictly on the merits of the intellectual positions they adopt. If GOI claims to have done purva-paksha, can they please publish it as its our civilization and we must be parties to it?

In any case, it would be a better scholarly event if the opponent voices that have critiqued Steitencron were also allowed to discuss their response. I was not even aware of such an event until someone told me on twitter.

Dilemma: Am I wasting my life producing hard research works if the authorities simple do not care to read it? Ironically, many of the persons involved in making such decisions know me and appreciate my work privately. But have they read it? And what happens in "official" decision making?

I mean no disrespect, but merely wish to raise issues articulated in IN. These deserve a hearing before the Neo-Hinduism voice gets GOI blessing.

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